Source:
www.abc.net.au...
Ok, so knowing to ask the right Questions and having proper searching techniques
and a Broadband connection to the net will make me a better Doctor?
We should have a Study where College and University Students use Google to try to diagnose a disease against real Family Doctors and compare the
Sucess rate.
I don't think the Medical community will go for this though
Millions of facts
Doctors have been estimated to carry 2 million facts in their heads to help them to diagnose disease, the researchers say.
But search engines allow them to get quick access to an ever increasing medical knowledge base that might be impossible to hold in their head.
Google in particular gives access to more than 3 billion articles, they say, with Google Scholar restricting searches to peer reviewed articles.
Dr Tang says while there are a number of other search engines that clinicians can use, they often prefer Google because it is so easy to use and
freely available.
So that's what it comes down to.....ease of use and cheap. Designing a search engine dedicated for medical practicioners makes more sense, but hell
what do I know I'm no Doctor!
Another interesting finding was that clinical nurse consultants using the search engines were just as accurate as doctors
See? were getting somewhere!
Professor Westbrook says that while Google might be good for helping find information about diseases with unique symptoms, more sophisticated
search engines would be required for more complex diseases.
Prof. Westbrook is up to something.....
